


Sleep With Me

by Salomonderiel



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Cute, Hypochondria, Multi, but it's not as bad as that makes it sound, no panic attacks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-04
Updated: 2013-04-04
Packaged: 2017-12-07 12:09:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,400
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/748351
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Salomonderiel/pseuds/Salomonderiel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Joly gets stressed, he panics. His brain picks a symptom and he fixates on it. When this happens he loses sleep over it, and then sleep becomes a whole symptom on its own. Left to his own devices, Joly could panic, and not sleep for days. <br/>Thankfully, Bossuet and Musichetta are around to not let that happen.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sleep With Me

**Author's Note:**

> I am a sufferer of an anxiety disorder which, whilst not all the time, but most of the time fixates on medical issues. Put simply, I'm a hypochondriac who can also freak about other things. And yeah, I'd be the first to admit that hypochondria CAN be made humorous - I've used it, exaggerated about things, to amuse friends - but I kinda think we're, as a fandom, a bit at risk from dumbing down how scary and how life-affecting hypochondria can be. I have medication to help me control it, it's not always fun.   
> So yeah, some of this is drawn from personal experience.   
> The rest of it is fluffy Joly/Bossuet/Musichetta goodness! :D   
> So yes serious over - please enjoy!

“What we listening to tonight?” Bossuet calls out, leaning around the doorframe of the bathroom and unintentionally spitting toothpaste froth everywhere.

Walking past where Joly is standing, completely still and concentrating on his breathing – five counts in, seven out – Musichetta holds up the iPod, the title _Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets_ visible scrolling across the screen. She sets her hand in the small of Joly’s back, and he leans into it, before she’s walking off to put the iPod in the speakers.

Bossuet grins, revealing teeth covered in white foam. “Nice, _love_ that one,” he claims, diving back into the bathroom, where, Joly knows, he will spit out the toothpaste and rinse his mouth with mouthwash. “S’better than that scifi thing,” Bossuet calls, “that thing gave me nightmares.” And then, the sound of him gargling drowns out all other noise.

“Sorry,” Joly calls out, when Bossuet’s stopped. He still hasn’t moved, still counting breaths, not desperately, just out of habit, now.

“S’not your fault,” Bossuet calls back, before reappearing, wearing a stupid British Museum top that hasn’t really fit him for years, and baggy red cotton trousers Joly’s sure used to be his. He walks past Joly, pressing a noisy kiss to his cheek before diving past and landing, heavily, stomach-first onto the bed.

And technically, it’s not Joly’s fault. ‘Chetta chose the story. But then, technically, it is. It’s because of Joly that they all have to go to bed, listening to an audiobook. You see, Joly can’t sleep if he’s thinking about sleeping.

Musichetta’s back, and she’s shoving a mug into his hands. “Drink”, she instructs, but she’s smiling.

He looks at the steaming green liquid and tries not to grimace. “It’s _herbal-_ ”

“All things, including your little pills and medications, have come from nature,” Musichetta says. This is a familiar bickering.

“Not _everything-”_

“You drink it, or we pour it into you,” Bossuet offers, cheerfully. He’s already buried himself under the duvet. “Just do it, Joly.”

Anyone else might add the question ‘what harm could it do?’ But Bossuet and Musichetta know not to give Joly’s thoughts that opening.

Obediently, trusting his loves, he takes the mug and drinks it. As he does so Musichetta goes to get changed, tugging off her dress and slipping into a more comfortable nightie. Literally. She’s still got her slips, small flimsy things. But when you’re curling up in bed with one man who snores and another who drools and Stephen Fry is narrating at you from tinny speakers, you’ve reached the stage where you can wear an oversized Micky Mouse t-shirt to bed.

He doesn’t chug the drink, but he gets it down in ten minutes, the time it takes her to wipe off the makeup, tie her hair back so it doesn’t get tangled during the night, and to be there ready to take it away when he shows her that the bottom of the mug is now visible.

“Now can we get into _bed?_ ” Bossuet moans, and, smiling (he can’t grin, not this close to an attempt at sleeping), Joly goes to the bedside, leaning over and tickling Bossuet through the duvet. As Bossuet yells he just tickles harder, smiles a bit more, until Bossuet shoves down the duvet to get his hands free and tugs Joly down next to him. Then, Joly’s the one yelping, and Bossuet’s the one laughing.

Musichetta’s entrance to the bed is a lot quieter, slipping under the covers that have been put back in position after Joly’s attempts to get under the covers and Bossuet’s attempts to keep the covers vacuum-close to his skin. “Night, boys,” she says, reaching across and brushing a hand through their hair, before settling down and holding Joly’s hand. On Joly’s other side, Bossuet’s grumbling wordlessly as he stretches up and jabs ‘play’, before slithering back into place, curling up and letting his hand rest against Joly’s side.

Joly closes his eyes.

This routine is not every-day, but is familiar. He doesn’t consistently worry about his sleep, but, if he’s having a... bad time, insomnia seems to be the easy outlet for his fears. Secondary insomnia, where insomnia is caused by a pre-existing condition. In Joly’s case, that’d be hypochondria, medical-related anxiety. But the thing is, once you’ve got that symptom, that lack of sleep, it’s so easy for him to consider what else could cause it. Because sleep’s controlled by the brain. And if there’s something wrong with the brain...

A few nights, every few months, he gets like this. And once he’s started worrying about not being able to sleep, he’s not going to sleep, because the worrying is keeping his brain working and whirring and then he’s not sleeping and it’s worse because _what if it’s not secondary insomnia, what if it’s something worse –_

“Breathe, Joly,” Bossuet mutters, nudging him. “Relax, and listen to the legend that is Stephen Fry. Let him teach you about Harry’s summer in Privet Drive and how Dobby fucks shit up but how we love him anyway-”

“Spoilers,” Musichetta says, quietly, and amused.

Joly forces himself to breathe out and relax, curling towards Bossuet and cupping Musichetta’s hand against his chest. “Sorry.”

“Do you want a pill?” Bossuet asks, sounding tired but Joly knows he’ll be awake longer than Joly. Bossuet can’t sleep with the audiobook on. Musichetta can. She’ll fall asleep, and her slow, measured breaths will be calming, whereas Bossuet’s shuffling and lighter breaths will stop Joly from feeling stranded, abnormal for still being awake. When Joly falls asleep, when the audiobook has done its job and distracted him, then Bossuet will turn it off and get some sleep himself. “Take a pill, if you want. You’ve had a bloody stressful week.”

Joly doesn’t say yes, but squeezes Musichetta’s hand. Without a word she reaches over to the bedside table. “I put a new pack in here a few days ago,” she says, voice quite and calm. Her little bag is filled with various drugs, prescribed to herbal, but is never without a pack of Joly’s beta blockers, medication that prevents adrenaline from being taken up – basically, stops his body from having a panic attack. Doesn’t stop the thoughts, but they’re easier to control if his body isn’t freaking out on him. “Think you can swallow one dry?”

It’s been a while since he’s had to take one, but he thinks he probably can, so he lets her drop on into his hand without asking for the bottle of water. “The herbal-”

“Won’t affect it at all, you’ve taken it and the pill before,” Bossuet says behind a yawn.

Joly swallows it in one quick movement, and lets Bossuet tug him back under the covers. He can hear Bossuet muttering along with Stephen Fry’s cry of ‘ _Muuuuum! Muuum he’s doing you-know-what again!_ ’, with inflections in all the right places, and Joly smiles into Bossuet’s shoulder at that.

He’s had nights where he didn’t sleep at all. He’d be up all night researching and trying to stop himself hyperventilating. He’d once had a night where he’d almost drowned himself in alcohol, desperate for any way to get sweet oblivion of sleep. He’s had to mutter mantras to himself, remind himself of logical facts over and over again as his own thoughts try and tear them apart.

But it’s so much easier when you’re being held by people who you know treasure your health more than you do, even if that doesn’t seem possible. It’s easier, when you trust them to do what’s best for you, when you trust them to take you to a doctor at the first sign of something being wrong. Being surrounded by people you trust to be truthful, to panic only when needed, makes it easier not to worry yourself. Because you know they won’t let you die.

Joly has placed his life in the hands of Bossuet and Musichetta. He hasn’t told them so, in as many words, but he’s pretty sure they already know.

In the morning, he can’t remember when he fell asleep. He can’t remember anything past Dobby warning Harry in his bedroom, though. The clock reads half seven, and there’s sunlight coming through their tattered curtains.

And Bossuet’s snoring like a tractor, so Joly pushes him off the bed with a full-blown grin, and laughs along with Musichetta as Bossuet groans and swears affectionately at them both.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!


End file.
